


It Deepens Like a Coastal Shelf

by NeurotropicAgentX



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb/Sgrub Sessions, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Lusus issues, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 13:58:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10309730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeurotropicAgentX/pseuds/NeurotropicAgentX
Summary: Feferi and Vriska start hunting together because feeding a lusus can be difficult work. Not that either of them mind! They'regratefulto their lusii. Really!





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [theskyshouldbeviolet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theskyshouldbeviolet/gifts).



> Thanks so much for the cool, detailed prompt! Hope you like it!
> 
> Thank you to my great beta!

Feferi was hunting further inland than usual. After killing the lusii of a few volatile seadwellers, she’d found herself in the middle of combat, forced to fight sad, angry trolls instead of just their custodians. The fights had been gruelling, but the worst part by far was the killing. Feferi had never been fond of it. 

Hunting landdweller lusii was a much better idea. Even if any trolls worked out what had happened later, there weren’t many landdwellers who would brave the sea, even for vengeance. 

Feferi was following a large set of reptilian-looking tracks. She was almost sure it was a lusus, based on the size and depth of the tracks. After a couple of hours of tracking, it became clear that the trail went in a direct line toward a large hive. Feferi’s bloodpusher twisted. She really didn’t want to attack a lusus in front of their troll, but Gl'bgolyb was getting hungry and it had been too long since she’d caught anything. Feferi drew her culling fork and went toward the hive.

There was a loud hissing and scrabbling sound that got louder as Feferi approached. There was a huge reptilian lusus, but it was clawing at the hive’s main door. Feferi frowned and stalked closer. The hive looked like it belonged to a mid- or highblood. Had they locked their lusus out? 

Once Feferi got close enough, she heard the shouting. ‘Go away! The kid is dead. You’re not getting them back. Just go away you dumb animal!’

There was a blueblooded girl with a mass of wavy hair standing on her balcony shouting down at the lusus. She threw an 8-ball. It clonked off its head and the lusus reared back, making an even angrier hissing noise. 

‘Go away!’ the girl shouted again.

Feferi pitched her culling fork at the lusus. It struck just below the neck, severing the major vessels, so it died quickly and relatively painlessly. Feferi approached carefully, just in case it had enough strength to lash out one last time, but it wasn’t even twitching by the time she got there.

‘Thanks!’ the girl shouted down at Feferi. ‘I owe you one!’

Feferi smiled up at her. ‘It was no trouble! I needed to bring food back to my lusus anyway. I’m Feferi, by the way. It’s nice to meet you!’

The girl propped her chin up on one hand. It was robotic. ‘Huh. I’m Vriska. What kind of lusus eats other lusii anyway?’

Feferi bit her lip and shrugged awkwardly. ‘Uh, Gl'bgolyb, actually.’ In her experience it was better to get the revelation about her ancestry out of the way quickly.

Vriska squinted down at her. ‘Oh,’ was all she said. ‘So… how do you deal with the angry kids whose lusii you kill?’

Feferi blinked. That wasn’t the sort of question she’d been expecting at all. ‘It depends. I try and kill ones away from their kids usually. But sometimes it comes down to a fight.’

Vriska tapped her fingers along the edge of her balcony’s railing. ‘If you need someone awesome to pick off trolls for you I could maaaaaaaaybe help you out. As a favour.’

Feferi smiled. ‘That would be great!’ It was pretty obvious that Vriska had her own reasons for killing trolls, but Feferi wasn’t about to let that sour a possible new friendship. Especially with someone who didn’t seem bothered by talking to ‘The Heiress’. 

Vriska smiled back, her expression oddly intent. ‘Then you should come back tomorrow and we can go hunting.’

‘Sure!’ Feferi bent down to grab the reptile lusus’s tail. It was pretty big and still dripping blood, but she could haul it back to the ocean without too much trouble. It wasn’t even close to the biggest kill she’d ever carried. She heard a low, impressed whistle from above as she started walking back home. It made her smile, but she didn’t look back to catch Vriska’s expression. Gl'bgolyb had been waiting long enough.

///

Hunting with Vriska was a big improvement over hunting alone. It also felt a lot less wasteful and cleaner to kill a lusus and their charge together, rather than orphaning a troll. Vriska mostly used her psychic powers against opponents, but Feferi had seen her use her weapon once and the effects had been… dramatic.

‘Let’s get closer to the shoreline,’ said Vriska. She’d been pushing their hunting territory closer to the coast for a few nights now.

‘Why?’ Feferi asked, hesitant.

Vriska rolled her eyes. ‘Because I haven’t hunted there before and I’ll be able to find trolls who won’t run. Besides, I won’t have to worry about vicious sea-dwellers if I’m in cahoots with one.’

That surprised a laugh out of Feferi. ‘Vicious seadwellers! I’ve _met_ vicious seadwellers, and I don’t think I count.’

‘Come on, Peixes, I’ve seen you using that culling fork. You’re a great killer! One of the best I’ve seen. I mean, you’re not on my level, but I reckon you could take any sea-dweller we met. Easy.’

It was less funny now. Vriska was obviously trying to pay her a compliment, but Feferi found herself frowning and decided to change the topic. ‘Okay, let’s go near the coast, but I’m only looking for big lusii. I don’t want to hunt any trolls if their lusii might be in the sea. They’d be hard to catch.’

‘Whatever. It’s better catching a troll with their lusus. That’s the whole point of being here together.’

They started walking toward the coast in silence. After a while Feferi spoke. ‘Have you met many seadwellers?’ she asked.

Vriska snorted. ‘Yeah. I had a sort of pitch thing with one once. We flarped, but in the end he couldn’t keep up. I’m just that badass. Besides, I had other irons in the fire.’

Feferi raised an eyebrow. There was probably more to that story, but it wouldn’t be appropriate to push for more information. ‘That’s good.’

‘Yeah.’ Vriska glanced at Feferi out of the corner of her eye. ‘What about you? Got any spades? Or other quadrants, maybe?’

‘I used to have a moirail, but it didn’t work out.’

‘Maybe they couldn’t keep up?’ Vriska suggested. 

Feferi gave a rueful smile. ‘Maybe, I think it was more that Eridan just wasn’t that interested in being moirails. We weren’t very suited to each other.’ There was definitely more to her story, but she could hardly go into it here.

Vriska stopped dead in her tracks. ‘Eridan? Eridan Ampora?’ she asked.

Feferi glubbed. ‘What? Yes! How did you know?’

Vriska was laughing. ‘Eridan was that pitch fling I was telling you about. Ha! That little fish-face got around.’

Feferi frowned. Eridan had never mentioned having anyone in his spades quadrant. Then again, he never told her that much about his life, outside of his desire to kill all landdwellers. Then Feferi spotted a set of tracks and her focus immediately went back the hunt. The tracks were deep so whatever made them was probably big.

‘What do you think?’ she asked Vriska. ‘Lusus tracks?’

Vriska leaned down to look, her expression sharpening. ‘Only one set of hoof-prints, so it’s got to be a lusus and not some kind of heard-beast.’ Vriska straightened up and showed her fangs. ‘And a set of boot-prints. This is what we want.’

Feferi smiled back. 

They followed the tracks until they found a tealblood and their lusus. The lusus was like a huge herd-beast, but it seemed to have some sort of mane. It was definitely big enough to be worthwhile hauling back to Gl'bgolyb. 

Feferi readied her culling fork, and leapt forward just as the lusus charged them. She wanted to distract it so Vriska could deal with the troll in peace. The lusus charged past Feferi, one of its horns narrowly missing her and her fork. Feferi whirled around to face it, catching a glimpse of the tealblood out of the corner of one gander-bulb. He had drawn his weapon, some sort of spiky flail, and was whirling it around his head. Feferi trusted Vriska to deal with it and focused on the lusus. It charged again, and it was way too close for her to throw her fork. She braced for impact instead, holding her weapon out in front, ready to deal with those monster horns. 

The lusus ducked its head as it charged, aiming to gore. Feferi swung her weapon as the lusus came into range, catching one of its horns between the prongs of her fork. Her muscles tensed as she wrenched the fork around, forcing the lusus’s head to one side. She wasn’t quite strong enough to break its neck like that, but it lowed in distress and backed up to disentangle its horn. As soon as there was space, Feferi swept her weapon around, stabbing it through the neck. The lusus went down thrashing and Feferi leapt back to avoid hooves and horns.

She spared a glance at Vriska, who was rolling her dice. The tealblood must have been immune to her mind-control. Feferi turned back to her own opponent, but the lusus had gone still, its blood pooling in a teal-ish patch on the ground. Vriska yelled something triumphant and Feferi turned around again just in time to see the tealblood drop to the ground. A large smoking rock had appeared directly on top of him.

‘Bad luck!’ Vriska shouted. She turned around to Feferi and grinned. ‘That was my best roll all perigee! Did you see how that meteor came out of nowhere? Hahahaha! What a loser!’

Feferi grinned back, caught up in Vriska’s excitement. They approached their kills and Feferi felt a little wistful, knowing they’d part ways soon. Then Vriska froze as she got close to the troll corpse. She’d gone quiet. Feferi hurried over. ‘Are you okay?’ she asked.

Vriska’s expression was weird, but when she looked up at Feferi she grinned again, her expression kind of forced. ‘Of course! _I_ didn't just die like a loser.’ She looked back down at the teal’s corpse. ‘Sure is a lot of blood,’ she added under her breath. Feferi wasn’t sure she was meant to hear the last part.

‘Your mom’s going to happy,’ said Feferi.

Vriska set her shoulders. ‘Yeah, yeah she will! I’m the _best_ daughter.’ She looked over at Feferi. ‘And you’re pretty good too, I guess.’

‘Thanks.’ Feferi felt strangely warmed by the careless compliment. Vriska didn’t often say nice things about other people. ‘So… I’ll see you in couple of nights, right?’ 

‘Yeah, of course. Got to keep up the hunting,’ Vriska replied.

‘Yeah.’ There was a smear of blood on Vriska’s face and Feferi felt a bizarre urge to wipe it off. She gripped her culling fork tighter and forced down the impulse. ‘So, um, take care of yourself, Vriska!’ she said all in a rush and went over to the dead lusus so she wouldn’t see Vriska’s response.

‘Uh, yeah… yeah. You too. Look after yourself and… yeah!’ called Vriska. 

This close to the coast, it would be pretty easy to get back to Gl'bgolyb. Feferi lifted the corpse’s forelegs up over her shoulders and started trekking back home.

///

Feferi was fuming as she made her way to Vriska’s hive. Some calm, logical part of her in the back of her thinkpan was telling her to skip this hunt and stay away from Vriska while she was like this. But the rage made it hard to think through consequences properly and a bigger part of her didn’t want to disappoint Vriska by cancelling. 

She banged on Vriska’s door and stepped back. The door stayed resolutely closed.

‘Vriska!’ Feferi yelled.

‘Hey,’ came the reply from several blocks up. Feferi craned her neck to look up, catching sight of Vriska leaning over her balcony. 

‘Let me in Vriska. I want to go hunt!’

‘Yeeeeeeeeah, about that. I can feel the highblood murder-rage from all the way up here and since you’re immune,’ here she tapped the side of her thinkpan, ‘I think I’m going to stay up here until you’ve calmed down.’

Feferi growled. _Calm down?_ How _dare_ Vriska suggest she wasn’t in control. ‘Get down here, Vriska!’

Vriska ignored her. ‘So what’s got you so riled up anyway?’

‘None of your business!’

‘My hunting partner’s being difficult, which definitely makes it my business. Come on, Peixes, spill!’

Feferi growled again, low and dangerous. It didn’t occur to her that she could draw her weapon or start battering down Vriska’s door. Instead she hunched her shoulders and spoke. ‘Eridan came by last night.’

‘Ha! What did that lame fish-face want?’

‘He.’ Feferi hesitated, thinking back to last night. It had been an awful experience, with Eridan trying to get her into his flushed quadrant again. When she’d politely rebuffed him, again, he’d gone on to pressure her into giving their moiralligence another shot. When she didn’t relent he’d started talking about killing all landdwellers and how he needed to be calmed down or he might just go and do it. Feferi didn’t know why that had made her so _angry_ , but the rest of it passed in a blur and Eridan had run off scared. 

‘I’m not his diamond!’ she yelled. 

‘Well, _yeah_ , I know that,’ said Vriska. ‘Next.’

‘He, he tried to get me into his flush quadrant. Again! I keep telling him no and he just. Doesn’t. STOP!’

‘Ew, flush with Eridan,’ Vriska laughed. ‘He’s about fine for pitch, but only for someone less awesome than me. You’re close enough to my level that he wouldn’t work for you.’ Feferi paused to listen. Vriska stretched out her flesh arm and inspected her claws. ‘Why didn’t you just kill him if he was bothering you so much?’ she asked absently. 

Feferi opened her mouth then shut it. Her anger was starting to feel a lot less immediate. It was like nothing she could say fazed Vriska even a little bit. ‘I. What? No, I don’t want him dead. I don’t want anyone dead.’

‘Lame,’ said Vriska. She squinted down at Feferi. ‘You’re looking a lot less likely to tear up my hive. Want to come in?’

Feferi let out a deep breath. ‘Yeah. That would be great.’

‘Great! Down soon!’ Vriska called disappearing back inside her hiveblock. She didn’t seem even a little bit afraid, even after talking with a seadweller who’d been on the brink of a highblood rage. Feferi was caught between embarrassment and relief. 

The door opened. Vriska side-eyed Feferi. ‘Did you get _any_ sleep last day?’ she asked. Feferi hid a smile as Vriska processed what she’d just said. ‘I mean, not that it’s any of my business! Just, maybe you want some water or something. To drink.’ There was the faintest blue flush to her face and Feferi swallowed.

‘Um, yeah. I’d love a drink of water.’

Vriska nodded without meeting Feferi’s eyes and headed to her food preparation block. Feferi followed and stood awkwardly by the door while Vriska got her some water. She drank it slowly and both of them found other things to look at besides each other. Feferi found herself glancing at Vriska from time to time and couldn’t help notice some of the knots in her hair that were clearly crying out for a brush. Or a set of claws. Feferi hid her own faint blush behind her drink and tried to put it out of her mind.

///

Over time they fell into a pattern of meeting up every couple of nights and hunting together. They chatted when they walked and, more and more often, Feferi found herself lingering with Vriska in her hive before the hunt. Sometimes to grab a drink of water, sometimes to talk and sometimes just to… hang out. 

Tonight there was a certain calmness hanging over Vriska’s hive. They’d both done really well in their last hunt, both of them making more than one kill, and the usual sense of urgency was muted. Of course neither of them had suggested delaying their next meet-up. It would have seemed… wrong. 

Vriska was sprawled over one end of her cushioned seating platform and Feferi was sitting beside her, cradling a glass of water. ‘My mom was really pleased with those trolls from last time. I mean, she didn't exactly _say_ it of course, but I could tell,’ Vriska was saying.

Feferi smiled at her. ‘That’s great. It’s nice having a bit of breathing-space.’

Vriska’s expression faltered just a little. ‘Yeah,’ she said.

Feferi looked back down at her drink so she wouldn’t have to see that little crease of tension on Vriska’s forehead. 

‘Something bothering you, Peixes?’ Vriska asked. Her tone wasn’t even a little bit belligerent and Feferi’s hands tensed around her glass.

‘I. Could I maybe fix your hair?’ she asked, blurting the first thought that came to her. The thought that had been rattling around her thinkpan for nights and nights. 

‘What do you mean “fix”?’ Vriska asked indignantly. 

‘Just, maybe, untangle it a bit, maybe? It’s gorgeous, but, I mean…’ Feferi stammered. She was never this nervous, especially not around her hunting partner.

Vriska gaped and Feferi tried to remember if she’d ever seen Vriska at a loss for words. It was kind of cute. ‘Well, yeah, I guess! I mean, who wouldn’t want to get their hands in… uh, my hair is _fabulous_ ,’ she finished in a steadier voice. She turned her back without the least bit of hesitation and Fefer’s breath caught at the display of trust. Or arrogance. It was hard to tell with Vriska. Either way, a coil of pale feeling churned in Feferi. 

She was surprised at how hard it was to close the gap between them, to actually put her hands in Vriska’s hair. The feel of it was coarser than she’d imagined between her fingers, but it was smooth. Feferi let out an inaudible sigh when she found the first tangle and focused her attention to getting out the knots. It was soothing work and Feferi soon lost herself to the rhythm of it, though she was paying enough attention to notice the change in the set of Vriska’s shoulders. Even her robo-arm was relaxed against her side.

The silence was nice at first, but soon Feferi felt the urge to speak rise inside her. She knew what she wanted to say, but deciding if it was okay, how far she was allowed to push… her history in the pale quadrant should be making this easier, not harder.

‘I was just wondering why your mom doesn’t do her own hunting,’ Feferi finally said in a quiet voice.

Vriska tried to twist around to look at her, but Feferi was combing out a particularly difficult tangle. Vriska yelped as her hair was tugged and stopped trying to move. ‘She’s big! It’s hard for her to get about and most trolls run from a lusus that big. And she doesn’t like to leave the cave much.’

Feferi bit her lip. ‘It must be hard. Feeding her, I mean.’ Feferi’s fingers had finished undoing the worst of the tangle and this time Vriska turned around fully to glare at her.

‘Well it’s not _easy_ , sure, but I owe her. She’s my mom.’

‘Of course! I just meant that you seemed kind of stressed, when I met you.’ 

Vriska turned back around and snorted. ‘Well yeah, there was a hulking lusus outside my hive! Funny you noticing how stressed I was,’ Vriska added in a way she probably thought was subtle. ‘Stressed in a way that maybe only _you_ could soothe.’

Feferi whacked her lightly upside the head. It wasn’t a pap. She was just… retaliating. ‘I’m just saying that it’s hard when you feel like you owe your lusus because of everything they’ve done for you. But maybe you shouldn’t have to be _her_ custodian.’ Vriska had gone tense and she didn’t say anything in response. Feferi hurried on. ‘Even if a lusus helped a troll grow up and protected them, that doesn’t mean that things can’t be hard or that… or that maybe things have been bad. Sometimes. And it hurts. Sometimes.’

Vriska brought her robot arm up and grabbed Feferi’s hand, gently disentangling it from her hair. She turned around again, still keeping hold of Feferi. ‘Look, Peixes, I get what you’re trying to do. First the hair, and now the flirting. I get it. I, I _like_ it. But it sounds a lot like you’re mistaking your issues for mine.’

Feferi blinked. ‘What? No, I don’t mind feeding Gl'bgolyb. She’s the only reason that the Condesce hasn’t come down here and skewered me! I owe her everything.’

Vriska grinned at her. The expression wasn’t very nice. ‘Oh yeah, I know. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t “hurt sometimes”.’ Her grin dissolved into an exaggerated expression of sadness and she pushed out her bottom lip.

Feferi scowled. ‘It’s not the same at all.’

‘What, so you _like_ killing lusii? I know you Feferi, you’re the least violent troll I know. But here you are, killing and killing, night in, night out.’

Irritation ran hot through Feferi and she sat up straighter. ‘I don’t have to like killing. The important thing is that _I_ don’t resent my mom!’

Vriska’s eyes widened in shock. ‘I don’t– !’ She stopped and bit her lip. Feferi wanted to reach out and stop her from digging her fangs in like that. ‘I just. I owe her everything and I love her, I do!’ She sounded almost panicked and Feferi’s blood-pusher ached with a twist of pale feeling.

‘I know you do. Look at everything you’ve done for her. You’ve been an amazing daughter, but you’re allowed to be stressed by it and you’re allowed to feel conflicted.’

Vriska swallowed. ‘I have been an amazing daughter. I’m the _best_ daughter ever,’ she said a little more steadily. ‘And it’s been hard even for someone as awesome as _me_.’

Vriska let Feferi’s hand go. Feferi hesitated for a moment before placing her hand back in Vriska’s hair. ‘Yeah.’

Vriska took a deep breath and turned a piercing look at Feferi. ‘You’re pretty awesome too, but you shouldn’t talk musclebeast-shit about how you don’t mind the killing. I’ve seen your expression when we hunt.’

Feferi hunched her shoulders up around her fins. ‘It’s fine. It’s the natural food chain.’

‘Come oooooooon, Peixes, you want pale, you got pale. Stop trying to avoid it! I’m not going to be pale with a scaredy-purrbeast. You’re better than that.’

Vriska sounded so utterly convinced whenever she said things. It was always easy to believe her. Feferi took a deep breath and let her shoulders relax. ‘It’s hard sometimes,’ she admitted quietly. ‘I love Gl'bgolyb and the only reason she can’t hunt is because she’s right here protecting me. But sometimes it’s hard, yes.’

Vriska grinned at her and punched her lightly in the arm. ‘There you go, good. Now turn around and let me at _your_ hair.’

Feferi glubbed. The abrupt change of topic left her floundering and she wondered how Vriska seemed to shake everything off so quickly. Still, she felt a bit lighter having admitted some of her feelings about Gl'bgolyb out loud. ‘There’s no need to do my hair. It’ll just tangle up again when I get back in the water.’

Vriska rolled her eyes. ‘Maybe it’s not about you, ever think of that? Turn around.’ 

Feferi turned around and smiled to herself. ‘How could I have forgotten that it’s about you?’ she asked with mock surprise. It was also surprisingly easy to turn her back to Vriska.

‘Yeah, how could you, Peixes?’ Vriska asked. She was probably joking. Probably. Then Vriska got her hands in Feferi’s hair and she stopped thinking about it at all. Instead, she focused on the claws carding through her hair and gently scraping at her scalp. It was incredibly soothing and her eyes fell closed as the last bits of tension in her eased. Vriska was murmuring something, probably to herself. Feferi was finding it hard to concentrate on the sound and just drifted with the feel of Vriska’s claws and her voice. Maybe later they’d go hunting, or maybe they wouldn’t. Either way Vriska would have her back and it would be just that little bit easier for them to feed their moms.


End file.
